Clinician interventions related to alliance during the initial interview and psychological assessment

The present review is a comprehensive examination of therapist interventions and characteristics that have been found to positively influence the therapeutic alliance during the psychological assessment or initial interview. A major purpose of this review is to link empirically defined interventions found in the research literature to applied clinical practice so that clinicians from a broad range of perspectives can use these techniques to potentially improve their working relationships with clients during the assessment process. Specific therapist activities and attitudes highlighted by contemporary psychotherapy research are discussed and summarized. A general outline for organizing a pretherapy assessment based on the findings of this review is also provided. In addition, the research reviewed provides no compelling evidence to suggest that different practitioners should conduct the assessment and psychotherapy. Finally, there is some limited evidence to suggest that training initiatives may be helpful with regard to increasing a therapist's abilities to strengthen the alliance, and further research in this area is warranted. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved).